There's a red 93 wagon on ebay with no reserve. I always look those auctions over carefully, evan if they're automatics. You just can't tell when the right car will pop up as a bargain. Anyway, look at the pictures of the front end, and then read the description. It says the hood was slightly open for the photos: nowhere does it admit that in fact the hood is damaged and needs replacing. Same with the grille. It also calls the stock plastic hubcaps "alloy wheels", and describes the 2.3 liter 5 cylinder engine.

Some poor idiot who doesn't know what they're looking at is gonna pay too much for that car. I hate stuff like that.

Here's the link:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=31877&item=2457729783

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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

I must have been lucky...I bought an Ebay car....maybe paid a couple of hundred more then I should have...however, I did only bid on one close to me, and checked it (and the seller) out before hand...my mechanics thought I'd got a pretty good deal. It had the exact list of repairs needed (and chosen...I'd rather start with a new set of brakes pads dispite the extra mm left on the pads that could have lasted a few months...we've had a bear of a winter here) that my old '82 had at the same milage. The dealer was pretty up front about the car and I believe I paid pretty much what the car is worth...the ones I went to see for less $ were in much worse condition...
Think I got taken on a 1990 240 auto with 115000 miles for $2750 that has passed the critical eye of a very thorough mechanic??? I don't know...the car I was using ( '91 Toyota Corolla) got totaled by an SUV 'slip and fall' on my icy street, while parked in front of my apartment on Martin Luther King Day (bless that man behind the wheel...he hit 3 parked cars, totaled mine, and stopped to ring my door bell)...the insurance paid just under the total for the 'new' pokey Vo so I now have a better built and safer car for a couple of hundred...and I'm back in a Volvo...I have so missed my electrical disaster 1982 240 (she died 2 years ago), and am so happy to be in another Vo.

some of my favorite's on ebay are "GL"s have thicker carpet and 3 coats of undercoating.Also air bags in '86's.
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philvo '86 245 215k,'90 240 196k,'87 SAAB 900 SPG 213k

Alright, I don't know where you've been looking at 240s, but having pulled parts from a lot of GLs, including 86s, I've never seen an airbag in any 240 prior to a 90.

As far as the carpeting goes, I used the front carpet from a GL in my 87 DL wagon, and the color and weight matched perfectly.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

Cody,
I am just saying people on ebay like to add features that aren't there.
I know airbags weren't around before '90.I know the carpet is the same for DL an GL and I know GLs don't have extra undercoating.I know plastic wheel covers aren't alloy.I was just making a point.
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philvo '86 245 215k,'90 240 196k,'87 SAAB 900 SPG 213k

Alright, you got me on that one. Ya gotta throw in a winky smiley if you're gonna joke around with me like that... ;)
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

Don't you get laugh out of some of the descriptions though, "real leather" when you and i both know it's vinyl.
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philvo '86 245 215k,'90 240 196k,'87 SAAB 900 SPG 213k

You would not believe the pissing match I've been getting into with this guy. He got real bent out of shape when I told him he was "full of $*@% and trying to rip someone off. " Boy, did he get huffy. He thinks he's a pretty important guy who has a "rep" to handle his finances on eBay, and he was quick to let me know that I was a small fry who only had three feedbacks (all positive). That was my measure of status, imagine that.
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'90 245 DL 253K M47

Absolutely, every single time. Most of the sellers probably really believe it's leather: they think all Volvos are luxury cars, and that they'd never have vinyl. Some people just don't understand that 240s were basic, goos working cars, and could be bought with very few options. I normally don't bother pointing out the error, because some of them get pretty angry about it.

Hell, even Mercedes-Benz used vinyl. I wish Volvo had sourced their vinyl from the same supplier as MB Tex.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

Hey, I looked at that car at Carmax 3 weeks ago, hood is bent, headlight right side mounting was broke, grill was broke, both fenders and rr door had 3 hour dents in them, probably just kicked out and forgot to take a picture of that area. Rear main seal was awash in oil leakage, it will need exhaust soon and I don't remember what else, He paid $3300. for the car that was worth $1000 in my opinion. Selling a car on ebay will get tougher in the future because of sellers like him. Brian 301-367-2244

What is the deal with Carmax auctions? Sometimes I wonder if they include sales tax with the prices people are paying for beat pieces. Most of the car jocks don't pay up for stuff.

I've seen stuff that is announced with not actual mileage, trans needs work, or engine noise, end up on eBay. There never seems to be mention of that stuff.

Chris, I don't get it, I buy cars there some weeks, resonable do the repairs and sell them. Other weeks the cars bring as much as I can sell them for fixed. It is a dealer only wholesale auction, they don't let the public in at all. I can't explain a $600. car bringing 5 times that??? I wish I had an answer so I would know which days to stay at the shop and not waste my time. Brian

That's what I don't get either. People fight over old POS Ford Aerostars with two or three rounds on the clock, and ex-cop cars with lifter noise and oil consumption issues. The Carmax auctions I've been to don't keep the public out, but of course they don't have a bidder's number. They have threatened to kick everyone but bidders out, because of BS bids by people without a number, and maybe they finally did. I think a lot of the auctions were actually retail purchases ("Hey, let me go to CARMAX and see if I can get a car"). But it's good for Carmax because they pull top dollar for some really awful pieces, so I'm not sure if they really mind that much... We got a sweet 96 Camry with a glass roof for peanuts in the dead of winter at one of their stores. No heat at all, plugged heater core, nobody wanted the thing. Went to get in it right after the auction, popped the hood, tightened the screw on top of the heater valve at the firewall, and drove back with the heater blasting. And nobody wanted the thing.

One thing I've noticed is that the better pieces, ones that have a few extra miles or a little paintwork at one point, but are still basically nice cars, don't bring the huge dollar that some of the piles of crap get. I think they're up in dealer-only territory. A lot of the stuff still goes for black book prices, but not Blue Book price! Really amazing. Then you go to a regional auction and the same cars bring much less.

One more thing is that the carmax stores are often in urban areas, where there are a lot of buy-here, pay-here lots. Those dealers will pay up for cheap cars, because their huge interest rate pays them back so quickly. I think that may be part of it.

My sister wanted me to go car shopping with her last year, and we went to Carmax. Of all the nice cars they had on the lot, she fell for some 3 year old little Japanese SUV at about 110% retail. I could see the draw: it had shiny black paint, an over-detailed grey interior, and the shiniest tires I'd ever seen. They must've put the tire shine on about 5 minutes before we walked on the lot.

It was obvious that my sister intended to buy the car on the spot, but she finally asked my opinion. I pointed out the whining a/c compressor, the delay doing into reverse, the obviously replaced radiator and support, the driver's seat that had to have been destroyed by a 500lb previous owner, and the abundance of scratches on the rockers. She still wanted to buy the car. I told her great, I was going to walk home, that I'd never ride in that POS, and she was on her own as far as repairs if she bought it.

She waited and got something new. As much as I hate the depreciation, I think she made the right choice for her.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

And don't forget the "Rare" bit.
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-------Robert, '93 940t, '90 240 wagon, '84 240 diesel (she's sick) , '80 245 diesel

I can overlook rare when somebody's talking about a 93 240, but I'm really getting tired of the leather interior and alloy wheel thing. I'd like to show up to look at the car, pop off a hubcap, and walk away without saying a word.

I bought a 1984 BMW 318i back in 1991. A friend of mine worked at the BMW dealership, and called me when the car came in as a trade. I bought it for $2000: book on the car should have been $8500, mainly becausei it had 28k original miles, but it'd had some bad body work done on it years before. Worst of all, the sunroof had been stuck open for quite some time, and the seats were shot. Off to the junkyard I went.

The seats in my Bimmer were blue vinyl. The stuff they used was heavier than the 240 stuff, more like MB Tex. The first yard I went to had exactly what I needed, but the guy insisted they were leather, and he wanted a grand for them. I tried to explain, but he just said "Mebbe it ain't thet fine Co-rinthun leather like yore daddy's Chrysler done had, but that's leather". He then told me that BMW never built a car with vinyl upholstery. I walked out to my car, cut a square out of the upholstery, went back inside, and showed it to him. A couple of the guys behind the counter laughed, and he said fine, maybe they were vinyl, and maybe he was wrong about the price. Just to prove how generous he was, he said he'd call the dealership and get them to price him out a complete set of seats, one piece at a time. Then he'd sell them to me for half of that price.

I never did get any seats for the car. I parked it in front of the house with $4000 on the windshield, and somebody bought it in about an hour.


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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

Why don't you "nicely" point out the oversights to the seller and give him a chance to edit the description. Except for the slightly bent hood (the radiator support behind it looks straight in the pictures) most of the other details won't really affect the car's value. The engine is listed as 4 cylinder in most place, 5 cylinder only once.

Occasionally I do "nicely" point out errors in ebay listings, but most times it either gets no response, or the standard "you don't know what you're talking about", so it's not worth it.

BTW, that's not a "slightly" bent bood, it's rolled across the entire leading edge. If I were to buy a good used hood, have the paint matched myself, and have a friend spray it, the cost might only be a few hundred dollars, but I'd hate having to look at the damn thing.

My point is that the hood doesn't look as though it was unlatched in the pics, I believe it was popped on one side because of the damage. If it's closed when somebody buys it, it'll be because somebody "worked" on it, and they should disclose it in the auction.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

what ever happened with that GT you were bidding on? did you get it? (I saw your name as the high bidder a few days ago)

just wondering!

chuck
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'88 244 171K, '87 BMW 325e 173K (used to feed a '84 245, '84 244, '85 744)

The guy pulled the auction on the last day. I was planning on upping my bid, because I really wanted that car as a 16th birthday present for my son. Oh well...
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

I was watching that GT auction too just to see what it would go for and I must say that EBAY should not let A-Holes get away with ending auctions just because it has not gone as high as they wanted too. I have always been e-mailing Ebay to keep track of people who pull out of auctions at the last minute just like they keep track of the people who cancel their bids. I'd bet in a month or so that car will be back on Ebay. What a JERK!!!

Sincerely,
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Julio Meza

1979 264GL B27F 122K

Features Added:

BW55 To M46, Central Locking System, 25mm IPD Front Sway Bar, 81+ Dash W/ Oil & Ambient Temp Gauges In C, Oil Pressure, Volts

Next Project:

+Cruise Control

That's not the way it usually happens, and I don't blame him for ending the auction if I'm right about the reason. The guy had a GT that was a trade-in, and had been sitting on the back of the lot for months. For whatever reason, it wouldn't start, so it was being sold as a non-runner. Now one of 2 things probably happened. Either somebody came to look at the car in person, made him a fair offer, and he sold the car. Someone also could have made an offer via email, and he ended the deal. Either way, the auction hadn't ended, and he had every right to take a fair offer. Once it's over, it's over, and the high bidder would legally have owned it, but if I'd been auctioning the car and had a high offer to end it early, I'd have taken it.

If the car shows back up on ebay in the near future with the same seller, then maybe you're right. However, if someone got the car running in the meantime, again, I think he'd have the right to stop the auction. Ebay won't let you change the auction once it has bids. How would you like it if you had a car that wouldn't start, and before you had a deal sealed to sell it as a parts car you got it running again. Would the person who'd been looking at it as a parts car have the right to demand it at the same price?

You were watching: I was actively bidding. I had at least as much at stake in the car as anyone on this board, and I'm not pissed off.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

In my exp. with those who end the auctions early it is usually 30mins or less before they cancel the auction. I have seen auctions that were cancelled seconds before they were about to end. I think if Ebay keeps track of how many bid retractions you have they should also keep count of how many auctions you cancel. You make a good point, maybe he got a better deal, maybe it's running (YEAH FOR THAT 242), or maybe the auction was going to low; either way Ebay should be keeping track of it. If this was 1 in 50 or even 100 I see were this could be an honest cancel but if there record shows tons of cancelled auctions I would say they are cheating the system. I never planned on getting that GT, too far away for me and not worth my time right now. I just like to know what the going rate is for anything Volvo nowadays. If it does re-appear in a month or so I wish you the best of luck on winning the auction. Have A Great Super Bowl Sunday!!!

Sincerely,
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Julio Meza

1979 264GL B27F 122K

Features Added:

BW55 To M46, Central Locking System, 25mm IPD Front Sway Bar, 81+ Dash W/ Oil & Ambient Temp Gauges In C, Oil Pressure, Volts

Next Project:

+Cruise Control

If it does reappear in a month or so, I probably won't have any interest in buying it. I wanted it for a specific purpose, and a month from now my son's birthday will have passed.

BTW, I'm 1000 miles from that car, and was still willing to travel to pick it up. A GT is the only 240 I've found that interests my son, and I've never seen one close to here. A proper market value wasn't going to be established with that car, it didn't run and most of the bidders hadn't seen it in person. It could just as easily have sold for $200 or $2000, and had no bearing on what you should be able to buy that car for on the street.

Also, just FYI, the guy ended the auction while it still had several hours to go, and was well within his rights. I've cancelled probably 3 or 4 auctions in my ebay history (over 4 years), and none because an item wasn't bringing what I wanted. I've had overzealous types fling $hit at me about it twice. You called this guy a name in your original post, and you weren't even involved in the auction. Let it go, this isn't real life. Things go wrong, and people have legitimate reasons more times than not. Trust me, I get mad as the next guy when somebody really does try to rip me off, and I just don't believe this was one of those times.

I hope you'll have a great Superbowl Sunday: I won't watch it. I have exactly one sporting event that I care about every year, and that's the Indy 500. The next time it runs on my birthday, I'm gonna be there in person.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

Yes I read as far as the claimed "leather" interior. I emailed him about the "leather" in his description, he replied "it should have been leatherette" and added a change at the bottom. Good catch on the rest of it, didn't read the whole thing or he would have had more to add ;-)

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Dave Shannon
Spring Valley, California (San Diego area)
'84-245 200K+
'84-245T 190K+
'88-240 190K+
'92 745Ti 150K
'01 Jeep Wrangler Sahara 10K
www.volvo2.homestead.com